When my son was born, I decided to knit him a stocking. He was born in late November and in the foggy haze of those first days with a newborn, I started knitting a stocking that, due to some questionable gauge and design choices, took me a full 2 years to complete. Stranded color work on size 0 needles. There was no pattern, I just made it up as I went. There will never be a pattern because as proud as I am of his stocking that is covered with squirrels, pine trees, and snowflakes…I wouldn’t want to subject any knitter to what I went though. But I’m so glad I did it—my son has a holiday stocking that should be with him his entire life (I knit it so tightly it might even be bomb proof…), just as I still enjoy hanging the needlepoint stocking my grandmother made for me. Lucky for you all—there are good patterns for family heirlooms like these, and there is even still time to knit one for this year! Ann Shayne has created The New Ancestral Stocking available as a pattern or as a kit sold by Mason Dixon Knitting with Berroco’s Ultra Wool.
“To help you create your own Christmas tradition, we are relaunching one of the most evergreen patterns from our second book. The New Ancestral Christmas Stocking came into Ann’s life many years ago as a tattered photocopy of a mimeograph of a cuneiform stone-incised recipe for an oversized stocking, complete with intarsia image of a lumpy Santa.
Ann filled in all the blurry bits, deciphered many handwritten notes from unknown relatives, and redesigned her family’s treasured stocking for the Modern Age of Christmas.”
The pattern is available on Ravelry, and the kit is available exclusively in the MDK shop—you can find all the details here. Do you have a handmade stocking? Tell us all about it in the comments!
*Photos curtesy of Mason Dixon Knitting
I knitted Christmas stockings for all 7 of my grandchildren. I used the same pattern for all, “Snowman at Midnight” by Nicki Epstein from the 2001 book Christmas Stockings, 18 Treasures to Knits. The cuff was modified to include each child’s name and birth date. Varying Christmas colors of greens, reds, and blues were used. The pattern has an embellished snowman and lots of whimsical bobbles of “snow” falling in the background. It was lots of fun to knit.